The Monitor. [volume] (Woodstown, N.J.) 1884-1892, 1887-06-10
MONEY.

Jao - tHN "NbNAs
I'm cleaning house., said Mrs. Martin.
IF Mrs. Martin had been going to a
masquerade party she could scarcely have
disguised herself more Systematically.
Her head was tied up in a roller towel,
whose ends escaped behind, 'streamed like
q meteor to the troubled air. ner portIy
figure was encased in a coarse working
apron, her skirts were pinned up, and her
sleeves rolled up above the elbow.
Didn't know you calculated to com
mence today said the farmer.
well, didn't exactly owned his wife,
but the minute your mother made up her
mind she'd have the horse and wagon and
go over to Deacon Trudge's widow to
spend the day, | made up my mind to be-
gin house-eleaning. You see, Hosea, you
know yourself that Mother Martin is a
pleasant old lady, and l set a deal of store
by her, but she can't bear to have nothing
disturbed, and them files of old papers up
garnet. and heaps of rusty tins and old
bottles down cellar, and the broken crock
cry back of the pantry door that she says
she's going to mend when she gets time,
and the barrels of rags in the storcroom
she's going to sort over in a minute of
1cisure-
What are you going to do with them p
asked Farmer Martin, as his wife paused
to draw breath.
They're gone said Mrs. Martin, with a
roguish twinkle in her eyes.
Gone where q
Matilda sold the rags to a rag man be-
fore grandma wagon was out of sight,
said the enterprising matron. 'The papers
Elder Boley gave me five dollars for, be-
III they dated clear back to President
Zach. Taylor's times, and he said they'd
be a curiosity for the Young Mems Reading
Rooms. And the croekery and the old tin
cans and the bottles that amt good for
nothing under creation. | give Bill Belts a
quarter to take them down to the old well
by the stone fence, and throw 'em all in
WHAT cried Mr.. Martin. Filling up
my old well, eh? Where am I going to
water my %cattle?'
Tt amt but a little further to the brook, ;
said Mrs. Martin. And that well isn't
safe. 1t never has been since the curb rot
ted away
Many a gourd shell of pure cold water
I've drank there, when the old house stood
close by under the butternut tree said the
farmer with a sigh. before We pulled it
down and built the new one
Well you won't drink any more said
Mrs. Martin. The waters most all run
out since we dug the new well down here,
and I've had the children carrying cobble
stones there all the spring, to get the
huckleberry pasture cleared out a little.
And now the old truck has gone on top of
that-and a good radiance to two bad
things at once, says II
Mr.. Martin groaped.
We'll, mother said he, what bothers
me is--what will grandma say?'
7 suppose she'll be displeased, said Mrs.
Martin, stirring vigorously at a pail of
whitewash. But it's done, and it can't be
undone; and, after all, what is the use of
turning ones house into a magpie's nest?'
The farmer filled up his jug and retreat
ed to the remotest Businesses of the timo-
thy meadow, resolved to- be as far as posi-
Bile out of the way when the old lady came
home.
Hetty likes her own way said he, and
SO does mother, and when flint and steel
come together, there's most generally fire.
But poor Mother Martin came home in
quite a different fashion from what they
expected. Struck down with apoplexy at
the neighbours house, she was carried back
across her own threshold, dead.
And Mrs. Martin, who, in spite of her
peculiarities, had been fond of her, wept
tears of genuine grief, and audibly rejoiced
that grandma had never known about the
selling of tie old papers, and the filling
up of the ancient well.
So Mrs. Martin, senior, was dead and
buried in the old cemetery by the noun
tain side.
Strange, amt ito said Mrs. Deacon
Trudge. Everybody thought old Mis-.
Martin had money in the bank, and now
there amt a sign of it to be found
All fooled away in them deceivin' shares
that her son Josiah was ruined WITH said
Miss Grundy. That's the way it's gone,
you may depend
But Mr.. and Mrs. Martin could not be-
lieve that grandma could so far have lost
her senses as to fritter solid money away
like that.
AS sure as You live, Hosea said the
wife, she's put it away somewhere. In a
stocking or a bag, or UP the chimney, or
under the bricks of the old kitchen hearth,
and it must be found. For Matilda's sake,
Grandma always said Matty was to have
her money and now that she's engaged to
Rufus Barton, and
It's my opinion, IIetty, said the farmer,
shaking his head in a diseouraging way,
that You sold that money, done up in the
rag bags
'Nonsense!' said Mrs. Martin, growing
pale. 1t might had beer in the files OF
pap laid fat and stitched down.
I've heard of such things. And to speak
the truth, Hosea, I've been to the Elders
o,,d loolnd ovor avery identical one of them